


Ain't No Grave

by Thunderhel



Series: Monster Haus [6]
Category: Check Please! (Webcomic)
Genre: M/M, Magic AU, Temporary Character Death, monster au
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-11-06
Updated: 2016-11-06
Packaged: 2018-08-29 05:45:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,709
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8477575
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Thunderhel/pseuds/Thunderhel
Summary: "Dex had always seemed so indestructible. His head could come off. With that sort of physical leeway Nursey would have never thought him even capable of injury let alone death." 
  Anon asked on tumblr: So I saw a post saying that both Dex's parents have been to Hell, will Dex ever go will Nursey be so sad and Dex comes back like "I'm a demon it's kinda hard for me to actually die"





	

**Author's Note:**

> This prompt was so much fun, thank you so much to the anon who sent it to me. 
> 
> Part of the **[Monster Haus AU]()** , featuring Dullahan Dex and Vampire Nursey.

Six weeks and four days.

It had been six weeks and four days since everything had come crashing down.

Dex had stopped texting towards the end of winter break. He had just seemed to drop off the face of the earth as he stopped responding to Nursey’s texts and the group chat. It hadn’t felt all that odd at the time, just Dex being his usual reclusive self.

Then he hadn’t shown on on his move in day and everyone started to question. When he missed the first team meeting, a sick feeling had begun to creep up Nursey’s spine, though he told Chowder was he sure it was fine. When he missed their first practice of the semester, no one had any comforting words to offer.

It was that night that Hall and Murray called the team in, and delivered the news with lowered eyes and tense shoulders.

None of it still felt real to Nursey. Not the cold shock that had raced through his veins, not Lardo’s pearly tears striking the floor or the thunderstorm Chowder had caused that had ripped the gutters off the Haus.

Dex had always seemed so indestructible. His head could come off. With that sort of physical leeway Nursey would have never thought him even capable of injury let alone death.

_“He drowned,”_ Hall had said, his single eye glued to the giant S in the middle of the locker room floor. _“That’s what his mother said. A boating accident.”_

There was no funeral, Murray had told them all gently, his wings hanging low against his back and his usually glittering eyes seemed darker. Funerals weren’t how demons celebrated their departed.

The next night the team had gathered along the shore of the Pond, Lardo in the center with a tiny wooden boat she had built herself. It was sloppy and leaning to one side, off center without Dex to help her cut the wood evenly. They had draped jersey 24 across the wooden frame and stuffed it with letters and mementos and a slice of his favorite pie, and an ifrit on the volleyball team had lit it aflame before it was pushed out onto the water.

Nursey hadn’t cried on the shore that night, hadn’t been able to process anything at all as he listened to Ollie and Wicks sniffles, and Farmer’s mournful howl and Ransom’s barely stifled sobs. Lardo had lasted longer than he would have had he been her, and only a few minutes into the silence she had leapt fully clothed into the water and didn’t resurface for the rest of the night. Nursey had spent the night at the Haus, curled up on Chowder’s bed as Chowder had gone to stay with Farmer. It might have been comforting, had he not heard the soft wails of Jenny and Mandy’s own brand of mourning, echoing softly through the vents.

Six weeks and four days since he had learned Dex had died, and Nursey still wasn’t sure how he was supposed to deal with it. Everything eventually fell back into a semi-normal routine. Practices still happened and Tango still had questions and Bitty still baked and Lardo still painted. It took two weeks for any of them to manage a laugh again, and Nursey had even begun to smile again around week five, all of them going brief moments without remembering that Dex was gone.

Some days were harder than others. Six weeks and four days in had been one of those days.

Chowder had spilled soup all down his front at lunch, upending the cup on himself as he had gestured wildly. As Farmer had laughed at him Nursey had snapped a picture and had been halfway through typing out a caption to go with it before he had remembered. There was no one on the other end of that number to appreciate the moment. Everything had gone downhill from there.

It was nearing on midnight as he sat on the couch between Lardo and Farmer, Chowder on his girlfriend’s right and Mario Kart on the television. Nursey had declined to play, unable to focus on anything for too long, but he enjoyed listening to his friends laugh and threaten each other. It felt good. It felt almost normal.

“I made apple crumble!” Bitty emerged from the kitchen, hovering a few feet back from the couch. His smile was soft and there was a bit of flour on his cheek, but none of his grin reached his eyes. “Next lap ya’ll are coming in to try some,” he announced, hands on his hips as Farmer ran Lardo off the track.

“Shit.”

Nursey had barely eaten anything but blood for six weeks and four days, but he supposed he should humor Bitty. As much as they were all watching him, all stepping around him with tight nerves and pitying faces, he knew they were all hurting just as badly. Nursey was so immersed in the bright lights and flashing colors in front of his face and his own self pity and guilt, that he missed the knock at the door.

“Who on earth?” Bitty hissed, stepping behind the couch to head to the door. “Did one of you order pizza?” Nursey heard him call up the stairs before the door opened. “Hello, how-JESUS CHRIST.” His back was to the scene, but Nursey heard as Bitty stumbled back, slamming hard into the stairs as he tried to retreat. 

In the year and half he had been at Samwell Nursey had never heard Bitty swear so strongly or with so much fear, and Nursey was leaping over the back of the couch before he could process it. The others were right behind him, fangs bared and hackles raised as they swarmed to the front door, ready to fight off whatever attack was incoming, and all froze at the same time. The five of them stared, wide-eyed and shell shocked against the stairs at the figure standing in the doorway.

The smell hit before anything else, a mixture of seawater and fish and rot and sulfur. He was horrifically skinny, Nursey was certain he would be able to see his bones if they weren’t covered by his faded and impressively wrinkled flannel, hanging off of his bony shoulders. His face was gaunt and pale, with a soft looking black patch spreading up over his cheek. There was a scar going across his neck, and it looked like his head wasn’t so much attached as just sitting on the edge of his neck stump, the skin jagged and worn and not lining up correctly.

Dex had red hair and orange eyes, but the boy with his zombie-like face standing on the porch had sandy brown hair and his eyes were so cold they were almost grey. He had one hand on a heavy duffle bag hanging at his side, and the other on the top of his head, like it was the only thing holding it in place.

Nursey didn’t understand what he was looking at, couldn’t reconcile the vision in front of him with what he understood, and then the stranger smiled. It was wide, his lips stretching so far back Nursey thought they might touch his ears, and his yellowing teeth sharpening down into points with the effort. For just a moment there was a flash of orange in his one eye, before the grey took back over. “Hey, guys.” His voice was scratchy and heavy with what might have been exhaustion.

For a minute, no one moved. Then Not-Quite-Dex dropped the smile and sighed, looking annoyed as he shifted his bag. His head slid half an inch to the right before he caught it. “Okay, look, there’s nothing I can do about the smell, all right? I’m not fuckin’ hype about it either, but I took like ten showers, it’s just gonna be a thing we all have to deal with until it fades.” The expression was so irrefutably Dex that Nursey felt his chest tighten, finally accepting what he was seeing, but he was just a second later on the uptake than Chowder and Farmer, who both knocked Nursey aside to lunge at Dex.

Dex didn’t have time to react, dropping both his bag and his head with a yelp as the two latched onto him. Chowder grabbed his head before it tumbled to the ground, pressing Dex’s protesting face into his chest as he sobbed over him.

“Oh gods, _Dex_!”

“FUCK, STOP. YOU’RE CRYING ON ME.” Dex grabbed for Chowder’s shoulder with one hand while he tried to pry Farmer off of his body with the other. Farmer dug her claws in as she rubbed her own crying face into his shoulder.

“What’s going on?” Holster appeared at the top of the stairs, Ransom at his heels, alarm on their faces and a hockey stick brandished in Holster’s hands.

“It’s Dex,” Bitty told them, not looking back as he joined in beside Farmer to cling onto Dex’s still struggling body.

“I wasn’t even gone that long!” Dex protested. “Get off!”

Ransom and Holster were suddenly barreling past, nearly taking the entire hugging pile out the front door as they slammed in. Lardo was in it then too, everyone vying for a moment with Dex’s head or a position clinging onto his body. There was a mess of Dex’s face being covered in unwanted kisses and ugly crying and Dex -sandy haired, grey eyed, emaciated Dex- seemed at a loss as to what was happening.

Nursey clung to the stairs, his world spinning and unable to join in. 

“Why is this Haus so dramatic all the time?” Dex demanded, finally getting one hand free of the hoard and pulling his head out of Holster’s grasp. “It was like…six weeks.”

“Six weeks and four days,” Nursey said out loud, unsure where his voice had even come from.

“It’s been months!” Chowder insisted, screaming almost directly in Dex’s ear. “You left for winter break and you didn’t come back!”

“You died,” Nursey said, his voice barely a whisper. “You _died_ ,” he repeated slightly louder to be heard.

Dex frowned, a crease between his eyebrows. “Yeah, I know.”

“You died!” Farmer emphasized, shaking Dex so hard by his shirt that he almost dropped his head.

“That’s what I said!”

“Your mother said you drowned.”

“We had a funeral!” Lardo accused, throwing a solid punch to Dex’s chest.

“Ow! Wait, what? Why?”

“That’s what you do when someone dies!” Bitty snapped. Unabashed excitement was slowly shifting into anger, everyone trying to brush away their tears as they turned on Dex. Despite the shift in mood, no one seemed willing to take their hands off of him, like he might just fade away if they let go.

Dex stared back at them all, looking equally lost for a moment. “Well yeah, but not a demon.” He frowned. “You guys…didn’t forget I’m a demon right?”

Bitty tried to say something, mouth opening but all that came out was a short sputtering sort of noise. Nursey understood the sentiment.

“Demons can die,” Ransom insisted, though he sounded unsure of himself.

“I did die,” Dex informed them, eyes flickering from one face to the next. He had a look like he might pull out a PowerPoint and begin a lesson in demon afterlife practices. Nursey thought it might help. “I fell overboard, got too much water in my chest and I died. So…they pulled my body out and waited for me to find my way back to it.” He shrugged again, like this was all very normal business. He took his time then, situating his head back on his shoulders and Nursey didn’t miss the way he straightened up, a hint of a smile pulling at his lips. He seemed…proud?

“It only took me six weeks,” he informed the stunned circle around him. “Two weeks faster than my brother, but, you know, it’s no big deal.” There was a color rising in his cheeks, not strong enough to be a blush, but something like it as he barely repressed a grin and stared at the floor.

“Got back from where?” Someone asked, and it took Nursey a minute to realize it was him.

Dex met his eye and that same feeling from earlier gripped him. That tightening in his chest, crushing his ribs harder and harder and Nursey was so glad he didn’t need to breath because he didn’t think he would be able to. When Dex tilted his head, he fixed Nursey with a confused stare, like he didn’t understand the question, like the answer was obvious. “Hell.”

No one had been speaking, but somehow the silence seemed to get stronger, more palpable as they all stared at him.

“What?”

Dex glanced around, eyebrows raised. “Yeah, where else would I go?”

“What…was that like?” Holster asked after a horrible pause.

The flicker of orange rose back up in Dex’s eyes for just a moment before it quieted down again. “It was Hell.” His tone was casual but there was a tension in his jaw that wasn’t there before and no one asked any more questions.

Chowder still had one hand balled in the fabric of Dex’s tee shirt and Farmer had a tight grip around his waist as both Lardo and Bitty lurked by his sides, close enough to brush against him, but Nursey almost forgot them all of them when Dex met his eye again. His lips were thin and horribly chapped and his teeth looked like they were turning yellow – or maybe they were returning to normal – but when he quirked the side of his mouth, sending Nursey a wary smile, he found he didn’t care about any of that.

“Sorry man, you’re not getting rid of me that easily.” It was a dumb thing to say, a shitty one liner that Nursey should have torn to shreds in a second, but he didn’t. All he could think was he should have had more blood to drink, should have accepted all the food that had been offered to him. In that moment world was spinning and it was Dex’s horribly rotted but eternally genuine smile that was holding him in place.

“Excuse us,” he thought he managed to say as he surged suddenly forward and shoved his hands hard against Dex’s chest. The force was enough to startle his partner backwards, out of the grips of their team and company and almost slam him into the door. Nursey wanted to balk at the sight, at the realization of how weak he had gotten over the course of those six weeks, but he didn’t have time for that.

Despite their unwillingness to let Dex go, everyone seemed to back up as Nursey stalked through, no one offering any protest as Nursey shoved Dex out the front door and onto the porch. They had no privacy, Nursey didn’t image they did for a moment. Holster and Farmer could hear well enough that it didn’t matter which room they were in, and he could all but feel at least one set of eyes judging from behind the peephole.

_“Leave them alone,_ ” he heard Holster whisper, though it seemed useless as no one tried to follow them anyway. “ _They’ve got stuff to work out_.”

“ _I would murder you if you ever did that to me Holtzy.”_

_“Dude, if I died and came back from Hell I would be the most shocked of anyone I assure you.”_

He didn’t know if Dex could hear them, but he seemed at least not to take notice, straightening his head again. It didn’t seem like it wanted to stay on at all, the skin not magically reconnecting like it usually did, and Nursey briefly wondered if this was a permanent thing now, but he pushed forward.

“I thought you died,” he breathed out, the words too heavy on his tongue.

Dex frowned, both hands cupping the sides of his head, like he was trying to cover his ears. “I did, we just went over-“

“I thought, you _died_ ,” Nursey repeated, his words loud enough that he heard the Haus go silent behind him. Someone stepped back from the door and Nursey thought their privacy might be slightly more honest now.

At his outburst Dex had the good will to wince, glancing down at the wooden boards beneath their feet as he frowned. He looked so stupid with his hands on his head, and Nursey wanted to tell him so but the words wouldn’t come out.

“Sorry,” Dex finally said, glancing up from under his lashes at Nursey. His eyes weren’t right and his hair was all wrong and his skin looked about ready to fall off, but his expression was so gentle Nursey wanted to scream. “I mean it, dude. I am. I didn’t know you guys wouldn’t know and,” he frowned, a tilt in his eyebrows that shifted the softness in his features back into something fiercer, “I mean, it’s not like I knew it was gonna happen you know? Like, it’s kind of been a rough fucking time for me too. I don’t know how much you know about fucking Hell, but it’s not really a fun place-“ Dex cut himself off as Nursey moved forward, obviously bracing for a blow he couldn’t really defend himself from with his hands still on the sides of his head, but it didn’t come.

Instead, Nursey wrapped his arms around Dex’s exposed sides, pulling him tight against his chest in the crushing hug he hadn’t been able to get in earlier. Dex had always been a skinny guy, but it was nothing compared to the bones he was currently holding in a death grip, all sharp angles digging into his skin from beneath that worn flannel. When Nursey breathed him in he could barely recognize the scent. All he could smell was rot and decay, the sea and old fish.

Dex was tense in his grasp, and for a moment Nursey thought maybe he was trying to escape as subtly as he could, but when he shifted Nursey felt one of Dex’s arms tighten around him. When Nursey leaned back he brought one hand to the side of Dex’s face, fingers brushing his hair as he tried to help him balance his head on his neck. His skin didn’t feel right, it was too soft and too pliable, like if Nursey pressed hard enough his finger might go straight through his cheek.

With that possibility in mind, he kept his touch gentle when he pressed his mouth to Dex’s.

It wasn’t a long kiss, or a passionate one. Both the overwhelming smell of ocean rot and fear of Dex’s head tumbling off of his shoulders ensured it wasn’t, but when Nursey leaned back Dex was still almost panting. When he opened his eyes Nursey could see the fire behind them, vying for space amidst the grey.

“ _Uh._ ”

“You taste…like fish ass.”

Dex stared at him, one hand clutching his hair so hard he looked about ready to lift his head up just like that. He blinked once, his look of shock fading into mild curiosity. “When did you kiss a fish ass?”

Nursey rolled his eyes as Dex grinned. “So, is this permanent now?”

Dex didn’t seem to be able to blush again yet, but there was that same coloring in his cheeks. “Is what permanent?”

“Your head,” Nursey asked, trying for as close to casual as he could. Dex was always so warm, but the skin beneath his hands was almost as cold as his own and for the first time in years Nursey felt like shivering. “Are you just gonna carry it around forever now?”

“Oh! Yeah, that. No, no it’ll reattach.” Dex glanced down, like he could see his own neck if he went cross-eyed enough. “I, uh, died with it off, so it’s been like eight weeks since it was attached. It just has to…relearn how I guess.” He shrugged for the twentieth time since his miraculous return. “It’s just gonna be a bitch for a while.”

“Just like you.”

“Shut the fuck _up_.”

There was a knock from the door, startling Dex enough to nearly drop his head. Nursey turned back to the front door, glancing from side to side to take in the porch around them before looking back. “Uh, come in?”

“I think you mean come out,” Dex offered from behind him and Nursey sighed.

“I all ready did,” Bitty joked lightly, his smile still tense and eyes uneasy as he opened the door. Dex snorted. “I made cookies, Dex, if you want some. I added an extra warming spell, I thought it might help with, uh…”

“Yeah,” Dex agreed, beginning to nod before thinking better of it. “That’s great Bits, thanks.”

“What, none for me?”

“You come back from the dead and then you can have cookies,” Bitty told Nursey firmly as he opened the door for them both.

“I’m a vampire, I was born back from the dead.”

“Well maybe if you’re really good, Dex will let you have some.”

Dex passed Nursey on the way in, stepping squarely between him and Bitty and met his eye. There was that color seeping back into his pallid features, his eyes blazing for just a moment before the fire dimmed down to a weak flame. The world tunneled for a moment, and all Nursey could see was that flame and the tiny quirk of his mouth.

“Nursey’s never been good for second of his life.”

“I’m not the one who went to Hell.”

“Hell wouldn’t be bad enough for you.”

“Boys,” Bitty tutted, as Dex passed, shooting Nursey a chiding glance before following after him.

Nursey caught the screen door before it closed, staring after his friends’ retreating forms as they headed to the kitchen. He didn’t need to breath, his lungs as dead as his heart in his chest, but in the cold air, Dex’s scratchy voice shifting into a laugh at something Bitty said ringing in his ears, Nursey inhaled sharply.

On his third such breath, Nursey felt the world start to straighten out, and he let the door fall closed as he followed them in.

**Author's Note:**

> Talk to me at **[Dexondefense]()**


End file.
